


down the road

by kermitfotia



Series: hearth and home [2]
Category: Promare (2019)
Genre: Backstory, and also once again kinda a comedy, as a treat, once again. just one oc, this is just a direct follow-up to no plates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-16
Updated: 2020-07-08
Packaged: 2021-03-03 05:07:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,932
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24219376
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kermitfotia/pseuds/kermitfotia
Summary: Lio had never been to the mountains before, not really. It wasn’t like there were mountains in Michigan, so the best he’d ever really done was seeing them from afar, from the clutches of the foothills.He had never thought they would be this big.(or, Lio gets practically adopted by Mad Burnish part 2)
Series: hearth and home [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1748110
Comments: 11
Kudos: 46





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> hey guys whats up i literally wrote most of this in one sitting as a direct follow-up to no plates so like. would highly advise that one first? anyways this is a lio's cool mom fan account now

Winnifred Fotia was the regional leader of Mad Burnish; one of the most well known, well respected, and well feared Burnish alive. She had been Burnish since the days of the Great Blaze, had practically mastered her own flame, had been named president once, and hadn’t lost a fight since she was seventeen and stupid.

Winnifred Fotia was also a huge slob.

She looked over at the kid currently napping in the passenger’s seat. Poor thing. Prickly as a cactus until he’d conked out. If it’d been her at that age, she wouldn’t have been taking a nap in anyone’s car. Although, she also hadn’t been able to intentionally keep her flames up while she was asleep until she was near twenty. His gently floated in his lap, like little bobbing beacons, sailing along their gentle orbit.

She wasn’t sure if it was better or worse if he was doing it subconsciously. Both options said things about him that she figured no kid that young should have to deal with.

Either way, Winnie was no stranger to wrangling troublesome little sparks. Mad Burnish was full of twenty-something’s who didn’t quite have their heads on their shoulders yet, and she’d been helping handle little kids and their flare-ups for years. This kid honestly seemed less like trouble and more like tragic.

So on one hand, yeah, this was no big deal. Spontaneously take in a kid? Normal Friday night! Nothing she couldn’t handle!

On the other hand, once again, Winnifred “Winnie” Fotia was a huge slob. And her house was a mess. She was pretty sure she hadn’t been in the basement in the last two years, aside from throwing things down there when she didn’t feel like dealing with them. There was probably half a motorcycle down there by now. She wasn’t even quite sure if the stairs were still all intact.

Then again, her house was pretty sturdy. It’d survived her throwing an empty dresser down the stairs fighting one of her ex-Mad Burnish. The dresser sure hadn’t.

(Oh gods, they were gonna need a new spare dresser if the kid didn’t turn tail. That’d been her last one.)

She tapped her fingers against the wheel, trying to mentally list out everything they’d need. Never let it be said Winnie wasn’t a good planner—she’d been a damn good tactician in her day—she just had a tendency in her personal life to…put things off. Indefinitely. Perks and downfalls of living alone with no one ever holding you accountable.

Quickly, she took another look at Lio, dozing peacefully enough with his head against the window. She huffed a laugh and took the next turn smoothly as anyone could in an old car. Although, if he was sleeping through the racket from the engine, he’d probably sleep through a little jostling.

After all, the roads through the mountains were long and winding; some of the kids she’d worked with said they were like snakes, like riding up a dragon’s back. Winnie was long used to it. Without even taking a glance, she flipped open the console and fished out a tape. She had never replaced the old stereo in her car; the radio signal out here was practically nonexistent outside of Burnish communications, and it wasn’t like she needed a whole damn car stereo for that. A handheld radio was well enough.

There was only one tape she owned that she was willing to keep in her car. It was John Denver, it was nearly as old as her car, and she had three additional copies at her house. She didn’t even much like John Denver, but his albums sure loved to materialize in her possession. And hell, she’d take it, because she would’ve been heartbroken if one of her good tapes got broken in this stupid car. She popped it in and slowly turned up the dial to let the old speakers crackle to life, hoping they wouldn’t make that ungodly loud static screeching they occasionally liked to.

Luckily, John Denver sang at the only volume John Denver should ever play in her professional opinion, which was no louder than a quiet pleasant background noise.

Again Winnie started tapping her fingers, vaguely in time to the music, tallying up everything that would have to be done. The guest rooms would definitely have to be fixed up, at least one would have to get painted. She had an extra bed, a daybed, that could easily be moved away from the woodstove and into a bedroom when she had a proper one. A daybed was fine for a kid, and—she paused that thought to eye him again, and yeah, Lio was pretty scrawny looking. Thinking of scrawny, she’d have to get some proper food into him too, which meant that she would need dishes. And, ugh, all the extra dishes were in the basement, if there were any still intact. Winnie had been living on the same three plates, four mugs, and two bowls for a good few months. At least she knew how to cook a mean hot meal.

She frowned and jammed the skip button a few times, giving the radio a smack with her palm when it threatened to static out. Technology and Burnish didn’t tend to mesh too well, which was half the reason she was driving a car closer to a century old than not.

By the time she was done with a decent mental tally that resembled a feasible to-do list, Lio had started to stir. If it weren’t for his fire and how she could both see and feel it flickering in her periphery, she never would’ve noticed. He was quiet as a mouse, asleep one moment and blinking out the window with big, round eyes the next. He was slow to come to life, taking another minute to stretch out, languid and catlike and not at all like the jittery, scared creature she’d found in her car earlier.

It would’ve been naive to say she hoped he didn’t trust that easily; he didn’t. Plain and simple. But the flames didn’t lie, and his would’ve been enough to wake or protect him should they detect a threat.

Instead, now they danced around his idle hands like a familiar. They trusted her, jingling contentedly enough when she let her own sparks brush near him. She smiled and left him to it.

* * *

Lio had never been to the mountains before, not really. It wasn’t like there were mountains in Michigan, so the best he’d ever really done was seeing them from afar, from the clutches of the foothills.

He had never thought they would be this big.

To be driving up and through them, it was hard not to stare at their size through breaks in the trees, even under the cover of night. When he’d dozed off, the mountains had been nothing but a jagged line against the dark sky, and now they towered over this old car as it cut up and around them, scaling their steep sides.

“Nice view, ain’t it?”

He nearly jumped at the sound of another voice, fire at his fingertips, but his flames only purred around his hands, singing something warm and satisfied. Another light, not his own, brushed against him, and his own fires didn’t so much as prickle. If anything they settled down further, burning low along his skin with a comfortable feeling. What was the word…safe? He was safe.

Lio slouched in his seat again, sighing out a “Yeah, s’nice,” in response. He stretched properly, arms reaching as far above his head as they could before he was just pressing at the roof, feet knocking a little against the bag between them.

Winnie smiled soft and turned off the radio, silencing John Denver for good. “You’ll be able to stretch your legs out in a minute now, we’re almost there. We should be able to see it in a minute,” she pointed out the window, into the banks of trees, “around out through there-abouts, but we’ve gotta make a few more turns first.”

Lio just yawned, nodding and eagerly leaning towards the windows. He watched attentively when they turned off onto an unmarked dirt road, the car bumping along into the tree line and through the trees. The road seemed to wiggle back and forth, up and down and around through a few more twists and turns. He held onto his seat, glad he was too short for his head to be anywhere near hitting the ceiling when the car gave a few good bounces.

Then they made a turn and the trees started to thin, and Lio could see lights, like little holiday baubles shining through the woods. He scrunched up his face, nose nearly to the window trying to make them out. They were houses. All through the trees and along the cliffs. He gasped as they got closer, and there almost seemed to be a growing buzzing beyond the roar of the engine and the occasional flick of tree branches against the windows. He turned to Winnie, just for a moment.

“What’s that sound?”

“You’ve never been around too many Burnish at once, have you?” She smiled, wide and with teeth this time, almost like she shared his own childish glee. “That’s just the town. That’s what it sounds like. Not everyone can hear it very well, but I guess we’re two peas in a pod. Or, uh, two coals in a fire?” She laughed, and it was an easy sound. “What’s it sound like to you?”

Lio squinted, as if that would help him hear any better as they coasted along winding roads. But, the noise did start to coalesce into something else, like trying to tune into the right radio station.

“It’s like…like…singing? Like,” he tilted his head back and forth. “Like humming? Lots of it.”

Gently, Winnie clapped him on the shoulder. “That’s it! Attaboy,”

The road seemed to go up along the side of a sloping cliff face, now winding between houses and trees and fences and gardens. Lio was practically glued to the windows until they reached a bit of a flat clearing, like a field sheltered in by tall trees. There was a house on one end, and Winnie slowly let the car roll into a stop.

“Here we go! This is it!” Winnie chirped, throwing the car into park and hauling the key out of the ignition, letting it flare into thin air with a hiss. In one smooth move she flipped down her sunglasses, opened her door and jumped out, following it up by quite literally sliding over the bonnet to open Lio’s door and grab the bag at his feet.

He was slower to get out, carefully closing his door and staring up at the house as he stretched again. The air was crisp and cool, windier than it had been down off of the mountains. The house wasn’t like any houses he’d seen before, even in the dark. It had to be pre-Blaze, or  _ something _ , with it’s bright colours and chimneys and the wooden steps and deck that creaked under his tentative feet. What kind of Mad Burnish boss lived in a wooden house? Lio had always figured they lived in like, strange metal hideouts, or caves, or something. Maybe quonsets.

Of course, the front door was already opened and Winnie was already inside turning on lights. He gingerly nosed his way in just past the porch to see her throwing her bag down on a big kitchen table, following it up with her jacket and her sunglasses. She buzzed around like a bee, throwing closed curtains and picking up things, even doubling back around to close the door behind them. It was warm inside, in a cozy woodsy way, at least compared to how crisp the air outside had felt.

He just kind of stood near the doorway, watching her go and not quite sure what he was supposed to do until she came back with an assortment of blankets over her arm, and what looked like a set of old drapes.

“C’mon, take your boots off and we’ll get you settled. The sun will be up soon enough, and  _ unfortunately _ , I’ve still got shit to do sometime tomorrow.”

Still moving about as fast as molasses, Lio reached down to unzip his boots, kicking them into the porch in an unceremonious pile. Winnie gently guided him in with a light hand on his shoulders, bringing him into what looked like the living room. There was a big metal fireplace looking contraption sitting on a square of stone tiles, with embers still burning inside, and some sort of bed just next to it. It all looked home-y, in what he imagined to be a cabin kind of way. Lio had never been to a cabin that wasn’t abandoned.

She pitched the folded drapes onto a chair nearby and started spreading out blankets, even complete with fluffing up a pillow and throwing a puffy duvet over it all.

“Alrighty,” she nodded, vaguely out of breath. She pointed off out of the living room and motioned at something down the hall. “The bathroom’s down thataways if you need it. Don’t worry about making a racket, the floor’s creaky all the time and I don’t care, and don’t worry about the woodstove,” she leaned over to pick up the drapes again, balancing them on her arm. “I don’t want’a leave you out here to sleep in your clothes, but the only proper set of old clean pajamas I’ve got are these,” and she unfolded the fabric, revealing not drapes, but a pair of flannel pajama pants and some kind of patterned long-sleeve nightgown, complete with little ruffles around the neck.

Lio only nodded in silence, eyes about as wide as dinner plates. Winnie worried a little at his hesitation, thinking he might not want to take old clothes. Kids were like that, could be strange about what they turned up their noses at. But Lio hadn’t been expecting anything. He took both garments out of her hands and hugged them to his chest for a moment, not sure what to say. The fabric was old and soft, if not a little crisp.

Then he smiled, small and genuine and hiding under his hair by not looking up from the floor. “Thank you.”

Winnie shrugged, ran a hand up through her hair and didn’t know what to do with it next, awkwardly letting it flutter through the air. She went to pat him on the shoulder, but then settled for ruffling through the top of his messy hair, mussing it even further. “It’s nothin’, really. Go get changed and get comfy. And don’t worry about sleeping in! You need to get some rest in a proper bed, cause I doubt you’re gettin’ anywhere near enough if you fell asleep in my goddamn loud car. That thing used to wake up my neighbours.”

She hesitated in place for another moment before finally stepping away and turning around to start turning off lights again. Lio scurried off to the bathroom, feet barely a pitter-patter on the floor. While he was gone she tried to tidy up as well as she could, and decided to throw another log in the stove for good measure, even if it wasn’t that cold outside. It was running on embers now anyways, better to keep it going than let it go out.

She had her hands stuck right in the hearth, just situating it when the door creaked open again, and Lio came back down the hall with an armful of dirty clothes, practically drowning in those old pajamas. He must’ve had the pants rolled up three or four times and they still caught under his feet, and the nightgown was swishing near his ankles. Winnie turned away to grab her bag off of the kitchen table to keep from smiling too wide. She could’ve pinched his cheeks, like some grandma. She was too young for that yet, or at least she hoped.

When she turned back around he was back at the daybed, pulling back the blankets all proper. She glanced at the woodstove, glanced at Lio, and nodded to herself as she made for the last nightswitch, almost conflicted about leaving him to situate himself. Gods, she really was a bit of a mother hen, wasn’t she. Already going soft as a peach on the inside at thirty-something. (It shouldn’t have been a surprise, she’d been helping take care of her Burnish for years now.)

“I’ll turn these off now and see you in the morning, alright?”

Lio’s eyes practically glowed in the dark, so she could still see him nod in the dim lighting between the stove and the hall light. “Thanks…Winnie. Night.”

She flicked off the switch.

“Goodnight.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so i actually wrote like a good chunk of this immediately after the first part andmostly forgot about it? until now? so here it is now because i think its good

For the first time in far too long, Lio Fotia woke up in a real bed. One with a decent mattress too! Really, he couldn’t remember how long it’d been since he’d slept on anything other than the ground, aside from one or two shitty abandoned motels that barely qualified as having beds.

He started to roll over, and then rolled back again when his outstretched hand met air instead of mattress. Right. Not a very big bed, but a bed nonetheless.

Slowly, he sat up and yawned wide, peeling back the layers of blankets. He cast a slow look around the room; it was hard to say what time it was, with warm light coming in through the half-opened curtains and the stove still happily crackling away. Lio tentatively liked the woodstove. He’d never lived in a house with any kind of real hearth, whether it was a stove or a fireplace, and there was something undeniably _nice_ about it. Something pleasant about waking up with the awareness of a low-burning fire a few feet away and the smell of burning wood.

He quietly slipped out of bed, toeing onto the tiled hearth and crouching in front of the stove to cradle his hands in front of the little window. The fire reached higher, batting against the glass as if saying hello.

Lio smiled to himself and waved back, contented with how the fire chimed back at him. He’d always liked the sounds the fire made **—** at least the happy ones, when it almost sounded like music, like laughing.

He was tempted to reach for the door, to open the stove and let the fire out, or to stick his own hands in, when he heard the creaking of wooden floorboards and a door loudly coming opened and closed. He drew back a smidge and looked over to spot Winnifred coming in the porch, a big bag of flour tucked under her arm.

It was different seeing her in soft daylight; it was almost hard to believe she was Mad Burnish like this. She almost could’ve been normal. On the other hand, it would’ve been hard _not_ to believe it too, with the way her flyaway curls seemed to suggest strawberry flames, with her tall dark boots and her biker’s gloves. Even in the way she carried herself, tall and confident. Lio thought she looked a bit like a bonfire given form. Big, and safe enough, but ready to blaze into something far bigger and brighter when you weren’t looking.

She smiled when she saw him out of bed, and motioned to the kitchen with her chin. “Hey! You want pancakes?”

Lio’s eyebrows shot up into his bangs. Well, he certainly wasn’t one to refuse that.

* * *

It almost felt novelty to sit at a real, sturdy, kitchen table. It’d been a long time. Lio couldn’t remember the last time he’d had pancakes, let alone pancakes from scratch.

The curtains were wide open now, and the kitchen window was blowing in a soft breeze while Winnie buzzed about. She kept glancing at her arm, and when he’d asked about it she had laughed and told him that’s where she’d written down the recipe. She was odd to watch like that, absolutely nothing like what Lio remembered of his mother cooking.

He swung his legs in the chair and looked around, taking in every odd detail in the daylight. There were strange little knick-knacks populating the living room and some of the kitchen, and he didn’t know what to even call half of them. A lot of things were mismatched, in an odd old and thrown together way, like a patchwork quilt. There was an actual patchwork quilt thrown over one of the kitchen chairs too. He could see an old boxy tv in the living room, and there was a phone on one wall of the kitchen. It was gaudy. Comfortably gaudy.

He vaguely wondered, if he’d had grandparents, if she could’ve lived somewhere like this, somewhere so oddly outdated. Not sterile, like in movies and museums trying to recreate the old world, not some odd faux time capsule, but real. Still living and breathing. A new-old-world.

It wasn’t long before Winnie was flipping kinda misshapen pancakes onto plates and laying them out on the table, along with a big jar of some sort of jam she fetched out of a cupboard. She doubled back for a teapot on the stove and poured that out into two big mugs.

She paused for a moment, mugs in hand. “Kids your age don’t go for coffee, do they?”

Lio shook his head. He’d never had a coffee in his life, truth be told. Winnie nodded to herself and set the mugs down. She slid into her chair, across the table from him shortways. They both stared at each other for an awkward moment, Lio with his hands still folded on the table in front of him and Winnifred with fork and knife in hand.

“You don’t need to wait for me? Go on,” Winnie smiled and waved her fork, twirling it around a few times. “If you want some jam I’ll crack it open. Unfortunately, everyone ‘round here is out of syrup,”

“That’s fine,” Lio mumbled, practically tripping over himself trying to pick up his own utensils with fumbling fingers. “Thanks.” Every engrained childhood manner about sitting properly at a table mostly went out the window the second he started putting food in his mouth. Weeks on end of nothing but gas station snacks and stolen fast food had made it hard to remember what anything decent tasted like.

He tore through three pancakes, barely noticing when Winnie kept silently sliding another one onto his plate. He hadn’t even touched the jam.

“Are they any good there lightning bug?”

Lio nodded vigorously, almost out of breath and reaching for his mug of tea. It was something vaguely spiced, but drinking it that fast, it mostly just tasted hot.

“Good! A kid your age needs a good breakfast! Most important meal of the day, even if it’s two in the afternoon,” Winnie laughed. She got up from the table, ruffling his hair as she took the dishes. “I think those were my best ones in awhile? We’ll have to sort out your hair too, otherwise you’ll end up with a birds nest in there.”

He turned to give her a weird look, somewhere between questioning and confused, watching her back as she started piling dishes in the sink. Not that it was really a lot of dishes, but she seemed pretty concentrated on trying to scrub off the frying pan.

“So, um…” Lio worked one hand into his hair, twisting uneven strands around a finger. “Uh, Winnie?”

“Yeah?” She didn’t turn around, but he had the distinct feeling she was still watching him, keeping an eye on him the same way any Burnish could detect flame.

“How…how long am I allowed to stay?”

Winnie stopped. She put the frying pan down and nudged the water off, slowly spinning around, but not looking at him like he was pitiful, just looking. Lio had always hated being pitied, hated how easily others looked down on him. His height sure didn’t help either.

“I thought I said it already, but you can stay however long you like. I don’t mind. And anyways…” she paused, collecting her words. “You’re a kid, I can’t just kick you out like that.”

“Oh.”

That kind of logic had never applied to Lio. He’d only ever been a kid to be belittled, not to be taken care of. Being a kid had always meant being put in his place, being small and powerless. It made him emotional in a way he wasn’t sure he could place, made his hands shake and flare hot just to think about it. Before he realized it, like it was between one blink and the next, Winnie was in front of him, kneeling on the floor and gently prying his hands out of his hair, out of clawing into his clothes. Her own hands were warm, but not hot, warm like a rock freshly set out in the sun; not like a match or a spark or a line of gasoline.

They seemed to slowly draw the heat out of him, not unpleasantly but enough to leave him a little winded, just a little cooler. Like they’d lifted the fire off, eased the weight of it. But Winnie’s hands were still warm. For once in his life, Lio felt powerless in a way that was alright; seeing his own tiny, dainty hands held by hands he couldn’t burn, rough-hewn and calloused and fireproof. She had to be far more powerful than him, he thought, she had to be leaps and bounds and thousands of miles ahead of anywhere near where he was. Lio had never met very many Burnish, he’d always had to be the biggest threat in the room.

(He didn’t know it, but he still was.)

Either way, she was steadfast, smoothing her own thumbs over the back of his hands until they stopped.

She still didn’t look at him like she pitied him. Instead there was something soft and sobering about the way she looked him in the eyes. It was honest.

“I swear, cross my heart and hope to die, you can stay with me as long as you want. I mean it. And I swear I’ll do my best to take care of you then, same way I take care of all my Burnish and the same way I’d take care of my own kids.”

“Do you have any other kids?”

Winnie shrugged, cracking a lopsided grin. “Well I might have one sittin’ in my kitchen now.”

That left Lio gaping like a fish, and Winnie had to glance away, laughing just a little and shaking her head.

“Really, don’t worry about it. I’ve had to help take care of my friend’s kids anyways, just never had any of my own before. It’s not like we let kids in Mad Burnish either, so someone’s gotta babysit.”

Once it registered, Lio struggled not to giggle like a grade schooler, trying to picture the Big Boss of Mad Burnish running around after a bunch of little rugrats. Rugrats on fire. It kinda worked, was the thing.

He hid under his horribly messy bangs when he cracked a smile, and Winnie leaned down a little further, looking under and up to raise her eyebrows and give him a properly kind smile.

“Yeah, yeah, laugh it up kiddo. It ain’t all the vagabond life you’d think. Are you feeling better?”

Lio nodded, but clutched at her hands when she gingerly tried to let go. She squeezed back, letting his hands sit in hers, not trying to pry him off or pull away. (Lio remembered, when he’d been small, when he’d still tried to hang onto his parents. They’d never let him.)

Two, three minutes ticked by, and she didn’t move, didn’t question him. She just let him sit, let him hang on until he started to pull back, and she let him go then too.

“I’m alright,” he said, before she could ask. “I’m alright now.”

Winnie leaned back, waiting another moment before swinging up to her feet and perching herself on the table, just watching as Lio sat back up, and nudging his mug towards him when he reached for it. He mumbled a quick thank you before he brought it up to his mouth.

She looked such an odd mix of serious and soft. Like one of those old stern-faced teddy bears, the kind that were a bit stiff and sturdy when you picked them up. She let him finish his tea, waiting but not impatient, not in a way that made him hurry to knock it all back.

She took the mug when he was done, and put it on the counter next to the sink. Lio wasn’t quite sure what he was supposed to do next, so he fidgeted and folded his hands on the table, waiting for Winnie to finish tidying up. It didn’t take long; she left the dishes alone in favour of hefting the bag of flour on the counter into the pantry, cursing loudly, and then stopping, glancing at Lio, and cursing more quietly when trying to dust flour off of her hands just created a bigger mess.

Winnie sighed, and ended up rubbing it into her face when she tucked her hair behind her ear, finally settling on sticking her hands in her pockets and leaning against the counter.

“Alright kiddo, it’s—“ she glanced at the clock on the wall, “—quarter to three o’clock, which is to say it ain’t too late. If you want, we can take a walk into town in a few, fix out your hair, maybe rustle you up some proper clothes?”

Lio looked down, a little more aware of the fact that he was in pajamas that were probably old enough to belong to his grandparents, and shrugged.

“I…don’t have any money, and I wouldn’t wanna make you pay for everything.”

Winnifred just stared at him for a good minute, and when he didn’t say anything else she muttered, almost in disbelief, “Oh sweet lord, you’re serious.”

It only took two and a half big strides to bring her back to the table, back to sit halfway on top of it and look down at Lio. He was a little glad that, even quite literally sitting above him, she didn’t make him feel so small—or insignificant. He didn’t feel like he had to make himself small.

She took one of his hands in two of hers, just lightly. “Listen. Firstly, Lio, _you’re still a kid_ . You _should_ have more than one pair of pants and a few jackets, and I’d dare say you _need_ more socks and shirts and everything else. I couldn’t, and wouldn’t, expect you to pay for that. But secondly, things don’t work like that around here. Don’t ever think you can’t afford anything like that, and don’t think you’ll have to pay for it. A lot of Burnish don’t have a dollar to their name, and most of us don’t have any damn use for it out here anyways, so don’t worry about it. Alright?”

“Oh.” He didn’t really get it. “Alright.”

“Good.” She paused again, humming and swaying back and forth a little. “How about this: you can go have a peek around outside the house, and I’ll call a friend of mine to bring up some clothes and see if she can’t help with anything else?”

* * *

Winnifred opened the kitchen window all the way before she picked up the phone on the wall, not even looking to dial the number. She wedged the phone against her shoulder and watched out the window as it rang.

“Hey Fran,” she said, as normal and unsuspicious as possible.

Fran didn’t say hi. Instead, she said, drawling, “What the hell did you bring home last night?”

Winnie watched as Lio cautiously romped around the tall grass, in his worn boots and those tacky, tacky grandma pajamas. She couldn’t remember if she’d found them somewhere, or if they’d been made out of curtains a while back. He crouched down, all dainty and delicate looking in the way he picked a flower and brought it up to his face, sneezing when it came too close to his nose. “A kid.”

“ _What?_ ” Fran squawked. “You _can’t_ be serious. I heard you last night, and I felt so much flame it gave me a headache. You’re lucky I don’t think anyone else noticed it, considering I wouldn’t have been surprised if the damn sun was in my backyard.”

“No, he’s a kid.” Winnie flexed one hand, curling it opened and closed. “Just…happens to have some firepower.”

“Does _he_ know that?”

“No.”

She watched, as Lio tripped over his own feet trying to stand up from a crouch. He managed to right himself, dusting off any dirt on the front of the nightgown, then turning himself around to see if he’d gotten dirt on the back too, scowling when he saw that the hem was smudged up already. Full of manners, that one.

“Boss—no, Win, Winnie, you do realize how much trouble this could be? A kid like that has to have bounty hunters, or the government, or _something_ after him. I’m not tryin’ to be mean, but I know what you’re like.”

She cracked a smile, giving a small wave when Lio caught sight of her, and watched as he stared for a moment before startling and waving back with a little smile. God, what a weird kid. She still could’ve pinched his cheeks.

“It’s nothing I can’t handle. Don’t worry about it.” Lio turned away again, and she couldn’t help having to stifle a laugh when he actually picked up the bottom of the nightgown, lifting it to walk without tracking dirt onto it again. “Anyways, do you think you can bring over some clothes? Small stuff, cause he can’t be much more than five feet tall, and skinny as a mop handle.”

“Oh flames Win,”

Winnie didn’t bother responding, instead opting to keep on trucking. “Can you bring some of your fancy hair product too? Just to borrow. I’d say I’ll have to wash his hair out in the old laundry tub to get a brush through it later.”

Very audibly, Fran sighed. “Sure, give me half an hour. I’ll have to go down and pick up some clothes first, and you can pick from there.”

“Thanks. See you then!” Winnie chimed, promptly hanging up the phone before either of them tried to get another word in. She ambled over to the window, laying her forearms on the sill just in time to see Lio come back around from the other side, looking like he’d just gone and circled the house.

She caught his eye, and brought one hand up to summon and dangle a small set of keys from one finger. “It’ll be a few minutes, so do you wanna have a peek in the garage first?”

Lio lit up, nodding excitably and bouncing up and down on his feet enough for it to send both his hair and his nightgown bobbing with him. Winnie smiled and made for the front door, all too aware she was probably too quickly growing too fond of a five foot nothing atom bomb.

But with the way he smiled, earnest and honest and with enough stars in his eyes to be blinding, she couldn’t bring herself to care whether it was a bad idea or not.

**Author's Note:**

> please know ive got a reference for lio's nightgown here and its this thing because i think they are dorky and cute  
> 


End file.
